Ulpia Severina was Roman empress as the wife of Roman emperor Aurelian from 270 to 275. Severina is unmentioned in surviving literary sources and known only from coinage and inscriptions and as a result, very little is known about her. Her Ulpia suggests that she may have been related either to Emperor Trajan (r. 98–117) or the usurper Laelianus (r. 269), as they share the same nomen, and perhaps from Dacia, where the name was common. It is not known when she married Aurelian, but it might have been before he became emperor. She was probably proclaimed in the autumn of 274.
Aurelian was murdered in September/October 275 and his successor, Tacitus, was proclaimed emperor only after a brief interregnum, lasting somewhere between five and eleven weeks. Though coins of Severina were minted under Aurelian from 274 to 275, some historians speculatively assign certain unusual types of coins to this brief interregnum period and suggest that Severina either effectively briefly ruled the empire in her own right, or that there was confusion in regards to Aurelian's successor until Tacitus became emperor, and coin mints thus chose to mint coins in Severina's name. Given that no literary source discusses Severina, any interpretation of the unusual coins remains speculation.
Early life and family
Very little is known of Ulpia Severina given that no surviving literary source discusses her at all. The only allusions to her whatsoever in surviving texts are a handful of references to "Aurelian's wife" in the and the 12th-century Epitome of Histories by Joannes Zonaras stating that Aurelian married a daughter of Zenobia, probably an invented story. Her year of birth is not known. Through conjecture, it is possible to assume that Severina came either from Dacia or one of the other Danubian provinces, as the Ulpia had been common there ever since the conquests of Emperor Trajan (). It has historically been assumed that Severina was the daughter of a man by the name Ulpius Crinitus, a figure that appears in the as a paragon of military and senatorial virtue, a descendant of Trajan and the adoptive father of Aurelian. However, Ulpius Crinitus's existence is perhaps an invention of the , given that contemporary evidence gleaned from inscriptions and coins does not mention him. Severina may have been related to the usurper Laelianus ().
It is not known when she married Aurelian, possibly it was before he became emperor, and nothing is known of her role as empress and her political influence. The only reliable evidence in regards to Severina at all is a scant number of inscriptions and coins, which confirms that she was Aurelian's wife and that she held the title of . Only two known coins omit the title , instead styling her as . These were probably minted before she was made . In full, the coins title her as ("lady Ulpia Severina Augusta, mother of the camp, the senate and the fatherland"). Some inscriptions also style her as (pious ). Severina also appears to have been deified, as some coins style her as . No coins styling Severina as can be dated before 274 and it is possible that she was not made until the autumn of that year, perhaps around 29 August, coinciding with Aurelian's triumph celebrating the defeats and reincorporations of the Palmyrene and Gallic empires.
After the autumn of 274, coins commemorating Severina were issued together with those commemorating Aurelian; some coins included the profiles of both. On the coins, Severina is depicted in a typical way for her time, with braided hair drawn up over the back of her head and an austere expression. Typically, her coins include the goddess Concordia, though some instead feature the goddesses Venus and Juno, the standard deities for empresses. Severina survived beyond Aurelian's murder in 275 and the date of her death is unknown. Aurelian and Severina had a daughter together, though her name is unknown.
Dowager empress
Interregnum
Aurelian died in September or October 275, murdered by his own officers after his secretary, afraid of being punished for a small lie, convinced them that the emperor intended to put them to death. Aurelian's successor, Tacitus, was proclaimed emperor in November or December. Historically, many scholars, including Edward Gibbon, assumed that the "interregnum" between Aurelian and Tacitus was significantly longer given that both the and the 4th-century writings of Aurelius Victor state that the interval between Aurelian's death and Tacitus's rise to power lasted six months. According to their accounts, this period consisted of the army in Thrace, worried as they were complicit in Aurelian's murder, and the Roman Senate repeatedly petitioning each other to elect a successor.